I have been campaigning for more than a decade against newspaper publishers' use of bulks (aka multiple copy sales). In January 2001, when I was The Guardian's press commentator, I reconfigured the paper's monthly sales chart to show the true figures by excluding bulks.

No circulation director ever convinced me that this so-called "sampling exercise" was anything other than a way to ensure that, in a declining market, headline sales figures remained artificially high.

It was also clear that the system was open to abuse, if not by the papers themselves, then by the agents responsible for distributing them for a minute fraction of their cover price.

Over the years my bulks-excluded charts tended to show just how distorted the sales statistics had become and they did help to make the market more transparent.

Several editors knew bulks were worthless and, in private conversations, they would ignore them by referring to their "clean figures". Media buyers also regarded them as worthless.

Gradually, over the past 10 years, various publishers have seen the light. They knew that the "sampling" was having almost no effect on sales. People who read a certain title for free at an airport or at the bookies were not moved to become regular buyers.

Several also realised that the production on-cost was a waste of money. Among the first to drop bulks was Express Newspapers (fair play to Richard Desmond on this matter, at least).

Trinity Mirror also turned its back on them. News International never used bulks for its market leading titles, The Sun and the News of the World, but it allow The Times and the Sunday Times to do so.

The Telegraph Media Group's titles have also been unable to kick the bulks habit. And the most addicted of all, the Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday, regularly increased their reliance on bulks while others were reducing theirs.

The Financial Times has also been a regular user of bulks (now thankfully reduced) and, to my chagrin, The Guardian and The Observer refused to heed my call to give up on bulks. Until today.

It is ironic to read GNM's statement because, in explaining why it is finally giving up this "outmoded practice", it echoes what I've written so often before. Indeed, I could have written the statement by GNM director Joe Clark:

"To a greater or lesser degree bulk sales are used by newspaper groups to prop up their ABC figure.

"Yet their credibility in the ad community is low and for those affected by the recent investigation into airline bulks that credibility has been undermined further.

"We are abandoning this practice in order to present a clearer, more honest picture of our sales performance."

Note also his final words: "We hope that others will follow our lead." Well, let's hope they do. After the airline bulks scandal, this is an appropriate time for the whole industry to follow the Guardian's u-turn and clean up its act.